Burials entail many problems including those of adapting family wishes to the limitations imposed by available caskets, vaults, the cemetery lot and the requirements of a particular cemetery.
By way of example, it is not unusual for husband and wife to wish to be buried side-by-side with one burial, except in the case of a common disaster, preceding the other, sometimes by many years. As a consequence, the usual procedure is for a grave to be dug for the first one to die, a vault positioned therein and after the service, the casket lowered into the vault, the vault cover placed in position, the grave filled and the sods but back in place. On the death of the other, the same procedure is repeated so that each casket is in its own vault with the vaults spaced apart a distance that is in part dependent on the width of the lot and in part dependent on those digging the grave. As a consequence, the resulting side-by-side internment is less of a reality than the couple may have wished or envisioned.